{"id":349112,"date":"2026-06-06T05:09:07","date_gmt":"2026-06-06T05:09:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/349112\/"},"modified":"2026-06-06T05:09:07","modified_gmt":"2026-06-06T05:09:07","slug":"man-sentenced-to-4-years-for-selling-pill-linked-to-womans-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/349112\/","title":{"rendered":"Man sentenced to 4 years for selling pill linked to woman&#8217;s death"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao MvWXB TjIXL aGjvy ebVHC \">FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) &#8212; For the second time in Fresno County, a suspected drug dealer was sentenced for selling a pill that killed another person.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">On Friday morning, 25-year-old Antwane Dupree Lee, faced a Fresno County judge who accepted a plea deal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">In exchange for pleading guilty, Lee was sentenced to four years for voluntary manslaughter, far less than the 15 years to life he could have faced under his initial second-degree murder charge.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">&#8220;It&#8217;s something Mr.Lee didn&#8217;t feel he should necessarily do but it&#8217;s better than 15 years to life. He did not want to roll the dice on that,&#8221; said Defense Attorney Greg Gross.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Prosecutor Kendall Reynolds says they made the offer after weighing the evidence.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">&#8220;This case didn&#8217;t go to trial for a variety of reasons but that is part of the process&#8230;part of the process is to determine the strengths and weakness of your evidence and negotiations with defense counsel and if we can come to an agreement that encompasses accountability, we will certainly take it and that is what we did in this case,&#8221; said Prosecutor Kendall Reynolds.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Lee was accused of selling deadly pills to 34-year-old Vernisha Latriece Green in 2024.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">She was found dead on April 17, the day after the sale. This is the second case in Fresno County, holding a seller criminally responsible for a deadly overdose.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">RELATED: <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/abc30.com\/post\/suspected-drug-dealer-arrested-on-murder-charges-allegedly-sold-pills-containing-fentanyl\/14780736\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Suspected drug dealer charged with murder, allegedly sold pills containing fentanyl to victim<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">&#8221; This one was a little bit different, there are not the evidentiary issues that were the same in Cassidy&#8217;s case,&#8221; said Gross.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Gross also represented Cassidy Gonzalez, the first to face a charge in 2025. She was convicted of second-degree murder.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">RELATED: <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/abc30.com\/post\/woman-found-guilty-fresno-countys-first-fentanyl-murder-case\/16086254\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Woman found guilty in Fresno County&#8217;s first fentanyl murder case<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Reynolds prosecuted that case as well, and says dealers selling deadly pills will continue to be held accountable in Fresno County.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">&#8221; If we determine who you are, what you are doing, we are going to hold you accountable. The state laws here, sometimes it&#8217;s homicide and sometimes it&#8217;s not. In this case, it resulted in a homicide conviction,&#8221; said Reynolds.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC eTIW sUzSN \">For news updates, follow Elisa Navarro on <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ElisaABC30\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook<\/a>, <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ElisaABC30\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Twitter<\/a> and <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/miss_elisanavarro\/?hl=en\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright \u00a9 2026 KFSN-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) &#8212; For the second time in Fresno County, a suspected drug dealer was sentenced for&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":349113,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[142851,112,114,113,142850,294],"class_list":["post-349112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-142851","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news","tag-man-sentenced-to-4-years-for-selling-pill-linked-to-womans-death","tag-timely"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=349112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/349112\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/349113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=349112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=349112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=349112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}